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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22895614">Cabinet Man</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/shouscarrr/pseuds/shouscarrr'>shouscarrr</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Lemon Demon - Fandom, Neil Cicierega - Fandom</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, stream marketland, uhh idk</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 11:54:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,546</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22895614</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/shouscarrr/pseuds/shouscarrr</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>an abandoned arcade cabinet sees a human for the first time in like.. a really long time</p><p>this is a oneshot, it’s somewhat short and simple. but i liked it</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>58</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Cabinet Man</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>thinks of cabinet man by lemon demon<br/>thinks of touch-tone telephone by lemon demon<br/>thinks about both at THE SAME TIME</p><p>hey sooooo this is my first work posted on ao3 i’m still kind of getting the hang of it thanks for reading.. sorry for the lack of tags and whatever cause there’s like no lemon demon content on here afaik. anyway let’s goooooo</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Waiting. After being cold for so long, I can feel nothing. </p><p>Shallow but steady breathing keeps me alive and in focus. I barely feel air leave my lungs. I'm waiting, but for what, I don't know. Maybe for my pulse to flatline, maybe for my cabinet to rot. Maybe for everything to go dark. Maybe for things to go back to the way they were, but that'll never happen and I know it.</p><p>I don't know how much time has passed since the last time I felt a quarter clunking at the bottom of my lungs. I lost track a long time ago. I know it's been at least a year, though considering how much the wall paint has faded since then, it's a lot more. Thinking about the passage of time makes my exhaustion weigh in. I wish I had a body so I could see the world for one last time.</p><p>There's no reason for this happening. I was legendary; I was an unstoppable force and, God, I was so happy. Kids were crazy for me. They loved my game so much that they seemed to shake violently thinking of me and only me. </p><p>And I swear, I loved children. How they'd feed me with their attention and their tokens and how they'd cry and beg their mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers to play with me and make me theirs, because I mattered that much. Mindless and naïve and blind to the atrocities of my world, but exposed to the atrocities of theirs. How they would kick and punch and kill the ones closest to them to wrap their palms around my joystick. I was that important. They smiled at me because they loved me. The ecstasy got me punished, and now I'm hungover.</p><p>Adults are different. Their hands are colder than the looks they give me. They're too serious, they play me too seriously, as if I'm an equation. They're no fun, and I like fun. I make things fun and they ruin it, just like how they ruined everything. They turned me into a bank, waiting to be robbed.</p><p>This probably isn't as bad as I make it out to be; if I try to be optimistic, I can pretend this is a well-deserved retirement. But then why do I crave warmth? It's dead silent if you ignore the low hum of my idle machinery. It tells the limp cobwebs in the corner that I'm still alive, I'm still here and I'm waiting.</p><p>It's like this for a few more seconds. More seconds, ten stretches to thirty and then forty five. Minutes. Hours. Maybe a few days, or a week. I don’t know. I might never know.</p><p>And then I hear it.</p><p>The sudden sound startles me so much that I stop buzzing for a few seconds. Did I imagine it? No, there it goes again. Footsteps. The jingling of a key and the door handle turning. I can't move to see it for myself but it's unmistakable. One of us is getting stolen.</p><p>At least something exciting is happening after so long. </p><p>The footsteps are clearer now; the burglar's inside my lair. Their footsteps are slower now, as if carefully choosing a victim from the dozen cabinets in the room. I scoff to myself. I'd even find it insulting if they chose Pac-Man or Tetris over me.</p><p>I regret the narcissistic remark as the burglar begins to loom over me. I know he can see me. Does he know I can see him?</p><p>He's not dressed appropriately for the job. I know robbers dress in dark clothes to avoid being seen. No, he's in a white button-down and a black tie, along with some faded jeans and suspenders. I can't take him seriously, he's too casual, and then suddenly I consider maybe he's an employee and inside my cabinet, I light up excitedly. My hum skips a beat at the possibility. Maybe the uniform changed and he's bringing me back into the world. I'll finally see the kids —my kids— again. He whispers my name to me. He lifts his arm, as if to carry me back.</p><p>He has a crowbar in his hand.</p><p>Before I can react (is there anything I could've done?) I feel him jamming it into my side and screwing my side panel out and God, it hurts so much. It hurts so much and he's doing it so quickly and so surely as if he's been preparing for this all his life because he was made for this and I feel pathetic not fighting back but it stings so much that I'll die. I'm going to die. I could try and drive him insane for me and apologize and repair me, but he's an adult and he's too smart for that and he's already yanking out the panel like a waxing pad pulling out layers of skin. The money isn't even there, it's in the front pocket, and I realize he's doing this to hurt me. He's doing this to hurt me and it's working so well. I wish I could cry.</p><p>The blood's coming out, dark and red and oily and I'm going to die. It aches. It aches and my hum is showing it because it's so much louder and so alarming. It's a deadly sound and in all my life I had no idea I could sound like that and I don't think I've ever been hurt like this before and why does it have to be so loud, can't I die in peace?</p><p>I can't sense anything, just the buzzing in my ears and blood in my eyes and yet I notice the pain is throbbing, but it's not in precise strikes anymore. I realise he's stopped. His sneakers and the hems of his pants are stained red, and he's not moving. Is he in shock? He's in shock, and who wouldn't be, seeing a machine bleed to death? I'm beeping something out desperately and I don't know what's going on with me, I don't have control anymore. It's getting so hard to breathe, and good. I didn't want to die this way, or at all, but to be released from this sounds wonderful.</p><p>A few minutes pass. The pain is ebbing away.</p><p>It's there, but it's faint now. I'm dead.</p><p>Am I dead?</p><p>No, I wouldn't feel pain. And I'm still breathing.</p><p>Do you breathe when you're in hell?</p><p>I open my eyes, and through the thin red sheet of my lifeblood I see he's in front of me now. My humming gets quieter and I slow down.</p><p>He's looking at my screen, but this time it's different. He's looking through it. At me. Does he know I'm in here?</p><p>I let out four staccato beeps, I pause, and then one more. Pause. Short beep, long beep, two short beeps, repeat. Then three long beeps, and silence. He smiles at me. His eyes are like that of a child's. He understands.</p><p>With his finger, he taps four times in quick succession, pauses, and then taps two more times. I notice my side panel is screwed back on and he hasn't taken anything out.</p><p>He suddenly leaves, and I assume everything's going back to normal now and I'm going to have to keep waiting for nothing forever, until he comes back two minutes later with.. a mop and a bucket. He's mopping up my blood now.</p><p>This is so bizarre. But I'm not complaining.</p><p>He's talking to me. He's asking questions. Where I was made, by whom. He's a theorist. He has a corkboard next to his bed he's been keeping for seventeen years. It has a map of the whole continent, with yarn strewn haphazardly at first glance pointing to and from any bit of evidence, and tacks with sticky notes placed strategically with no room for error in his quest to find me. His speech flows excitedly like a kid arriving at the arcade. He's like a cartoon character, but I think that's what draws me to him. He fits perfectly in my universe. Not like a chess pawn, but maybe the hand behind it.</p><p>He visits me every day since then; he can understand what I say. I know he's an adult, maybe in his mid-twenties, but he's different. He's passionate and asks lots of questions about the town, the state and the country, and about the arcade. About me. He wants to know everything, how everything works, where we came from and why with a sort of youthful wonder. He brings Polaroids of his corkboard and VHS tapes broken down in quality from generation loss, just because he knows I can see them. His brain is a different flavour from the ones who clean me, but the same as the ones who created me. I imagine it's sweet. He's sweet.</p><p>He grows old, but he never grows up. He never plays my game, he just talks to me, which he proved can be more fun. I thought I was irreplaceable, but I don't think I could ever replicate memory. I am more than just a game for kids. Is this what mattering to someone feels like?</p><p>I'm not a toy anymore, and yet I feel loved.</p>
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